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by BansheeLydia



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alive Vernon Boyd, Angst, Canonical Character Death, Dead Erica, Death, Established Relationship, F/M, Ficlet, Graphic Description of Corpses, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Injuries, Multi, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-02
Updated: 2015-11-02
Packaged: 2018-04-29 14:57:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5131787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BansheeLydia/pseuds/BansheeLydia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>stoyd week: cry me a river.</p>
            </blockquote>





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**Author's Note:**

> follows on from 'Missing You', but a prequel to it, exploring the moment Stiles finds out Erica's gone.

Stiles can’t keep still.

He vaguely remembers Scott gripping his shoulders and gently guiding him to a chair in Deaton’s clinic, but he can’t sit still; his legs are bouncing, his fingers shaking. He chews at the skin around his thumbnail, nervous energy taking over, breaking through the numb that’s encompassed him over the last couple days.

The last three months have been hell. Three months without Boyd and Erica. Three months with them missing. Three months searching and searching, with no results. Three months of shouting at Derek; he’s their alpha, how can he _not be able to track them_? There’s been no sign of them and it’s been tearing Stiles apart, fears of what’s happened to them keeping him up at night, dread that he’ll _never_ find them eating away at him slowly.

Until, finally, a grim kind of acceptance. And then...

“ _Boyd’s back_ ,” Scott had told him, quickly grabbing Stiles when he almost sprinted for the door.

Boyd’s unconscious – according to Scott, he’d collapsed as soon as Derek found him in the preserve – but he’s healing. He’s lying on a metal table at the back of the clinic, out of view of clients and away from the animals to avoid chaos. His clothes are ripped and torn, blood stained, but the cuts the blood had been oozing slowly from are gone. His broken nose has healed and he looks – he looks like _Boyd_ again.

It’s this gut wrenching, confusing feeling. Elation because Boyd’s _here_ and he’s alive...but dread, cold and unrelenting, stuffing his lungs full until he can’t breathe because Erica – Erica wasn’t with him. Just Boyd, alone and hurt, stumbling through the preserve.

It breaks Stiles’ heart.

He wants to move, he wants to do something, but he stays put. Scott brings him food, Lydia tries to encourage him to take a walk with her, stretch his legs, but Stiles stays put at Boyd’s side, clutching his boyfriend’s hand as he waits for him to wake up.

It’s another day before he does. Stiles is half asleep, but the brief prick of claws against his palm lifts his head. Boyd’s in his shift, but his features ripple back when he looks at Stiles, fangs and claws receding and yellow glow fading from his eyes.

“Hey,” Stiles’ voice is raspy from disuse, but he manages a smile. “Long time no see.”

Boyd stares at him for a moment, then sits up, swinging his legs over the side of the table. His hands frame Stiles’ face, pulling him closer until their foreheads touch, and he shudders through a deep, shaky breath.

“Stiles,” it’s raw, quiet.

“It’s okay. You’re home, you’re safe.” Stiles reassures him. There’s the important question on the tip of his tongue. It’s been burning away at him the whole time he’s been here, but now that Boyd’s awake and he might have to face something he already knows...he doesn’t dare say the words.

“Stiles,” Boyd says again, “I...”

“Don’t,” he begs.

“I couldn’t save her.”

A whine escapes Stiles as he grips Boyd’s ruined shirt. “ _Don’t_.”

Boyd’s shaking slightly and Stiles can feel the wetness of tears splashing against his own face, can taste Boyd’s tears on his lips, but he’s in shutdown, welcoming the numb that settles over him. He doesn’t want to hear this. He _can’t_ hear this.

But Boyd keeps talking, voice quiet and fading like sea lapping at shore, like he’s forcing the words out, because he has to, he _needs_ to. 

“They kept us in a vault, we – we couldn’t turn. And she was so strong. She kept talking about how we’d get out. We’d get back to you. She laughed, saying you’d threaten to kick our asses for making you worry so much, but we’d appease you with kisses. And then...the longer we couldn’t shift, the worse it was.

“The alphas, they were talking about the eclipse. They were planning something. And Erica...she decided she had to make a move. I told her not to, told her to wait, but it’s Erica, right? She’s so – she was so...” he breaks off, claws dragging against Stiles’ skin but not firm enough to hurt or cut – even now, he’s always so careful with him. “So strong. So stubborn. She attacked one of them and they...they killed her, Stiles. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t save her. She hit the floor and she looked at me, she _reached_ for me, she looked so terrified...and she – she died.”

Stiles’ legs feel weak. There’s a brick wall between him and his emotions, but it’s threatening to crumble, and he doesn’t know if he can take feeling this properly. He doesn’t know how he’s meant to survive, to just carry on, without...without Erica.

“She told me – she told me to tell you that she loves you.”

And then he’s gone. Stiles _wails_ with it, palms smacking against Boyd’s chest as pain and grief rips through him. His knees find the floor; he’s unable to breathe past the huge, gasping, desperate sobs wracking his body. 

_She’s gone she’s gone she’s gone_

_Erica’s gone_.

“Stiles,” Boyd’s holding him, trying to keep him together, to gather the pieces that are breaking apart. His body is solid, grounding, his lips pressed against Stiles’ temple as he keeps him close. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“ _No_ ,” he manages to gasp out. “It’s _Erica_ , she can’t – she _can’t_ be.”

“They just left her there,” Boyd’s voice is so hollow, prickling at Stiles’ ache, “In the vault, with me, for almost two months...just lying there, broken and lifeless, her _eyes_...”

Stiles squeezes his eyes shut as the image forces itself into his mind before he can resist it. Boyd, in a vault, with Erica’s dead body; the _smell_ , watching her rot, trapped with the dead body of one of the loves of his life...

When he looks up, there’s raw agony on Boyd’s face, reflecting Stiles’ own grief, and suddenly, he’s the one holding Boyd, just clutching him close and trying to offer any kind of comfort, anchoring each other while everything is lost and broken around them.

He doesn’t know how long they stay like that, but he eventually hears Boyd’s voice in his ear. “I love you.” It’s an apology, a vow, a eulogy all in one and Stiles closes his eyes, knows that need to say it, reaffirm it.

“I love you too,” he promises.

He holds his breath, almost waits, but there’s no third, fond, ‘I love you’ from Erica, and his heart shatters all over again.

**Author's Note:**

> kirasmalydia.tumblr.com - come say hi? :)


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